Sunlight in my basket. Limes, lemons, mandarins, oranges. So many of them that I am making salted limes for adding to summer soda water and salted lemons for that little salty sour-sweet note that lifts so many dishes out of the ordinary. I’m making lime syrup for cordial, but not being a real sweet tooth, mostly for Asian style dipping sauce for things like rice paper rolls. I’m making Indian…
This time of year it’s the tomatoes sun dried in the peak of summer that are the treasure. They go in pasta and gnocchi and minestrone and on pizza. A whole handful go into ragu or bean stew. They go on crackers with feta and in tapenade for spreading on toast. And I have to admit, I have been known to eat them straight from the jar.
All in about an hour. I couldn’t bear the amount of citrus sitting around so I found an hour this morning to make preserved lemons (on the right), lime pickles (back left), lemon cleaning vinegar (at the back), lemon vinegar (tall bottle), and at the front, kumquat marmalade.
My glut crop at the moment is lemons. It’s not quite the glut it was last year. Last year at this time, this was what…
The cockatoos have begun stripping the bush lemon trees. They are very thorough and very wasteful. In a few days they’ll all be gone.
This is one for the breakfast party people. I’m not sure how it would go for preserving. For me, lemon curd is lemon season party food rather than a pantry item. This time of year, with lemons and eggs both in season, is it’s time to shine.
We have a few lemon trees, but my two favourites are the Eureka because it has lemons on it all year round, and this bush lemon propagated from a seed that came up from compost.
I love my kitchen. It has a great big central kitchen bench in the middle of an otherwise very compact space (in a very compact house). I means cooking can be a social activity – several people can chop and stir and roll and fill at once. Kids can sit up at a stool and be involved, and if they play it right get to listen in on adult conversations.
The hollandaise sauce looks so decadent, but it truly takes just 2 minutes to make and has just a teaspoon of butter per serve. It’s a very tasty way to add a bit of protein to the breakfast. I’m harvesting the first of the season’s spinach now.
This was an accidental discovery. I had some friends coming for lunch and I had baked ricotta with salad in my mind. But I’d forgotten that I’d used the ricotta. Oops.